Technological Field
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus and an image forming method.
Description of the Related Art
In recent years, demands for special color printing and high-value added printing is increasing in the on-demand printing market. Above all, demands for metallic printing and pearl printing are particularly large, and various studies are being conducted.
As one of such methods, a method of transferring a metal foil and a resin foil by utilizing toner as an adhesive layer is studied; for example, a method of forming a toner image and bonding a transfer foil only to a toner portion is known (for example, refer to JP 01-200985 A). This method has a problem that when the foil is transferred to only a part of the image, all the remaining foil is wasted.
In contrast, studies to add a glittering pigment to the toner are also made. For example, a method is known in which a metallic image is formed only on a necessary portion by toner containing the glittering pigment (refer to, for example, JP 2014-157249 A). However, with this method, required metallic feeling and pearl feeling cannot be obtained in some cases.
As a further method, it is known to form a metallic image by attaching paint powder to the toner image (refer to, for example, JP 2013-178452 A). In this method, it is possible to obtain an image with high metallic feeling, but it is difficult to obtain a mirror-tone or pearl-tone image.